Michael Stipe Mentions Morrissey in acast.com interview

Well, let's see... Jingly jangly guitar pop with sexually ambiguous frontmen with funny voices and strange lyrics... I've agreed for years that REM are America's answer to the Smiths.
Hmmm. I see what you mean but I think REM lack the cutting, biting, serrated edge of The Smiths. REM have a couple of duff albums after Automatic For The People so maybe they should have stopped too. Same for The Cure after Wish. Even The Jam could have turned to crap if they hadn't broken up when they did. Sometimes things happen for the best.
 
If the Smiths had stayed together, they probably would have had a career like REM's.
Maybe but they would have needed to embrace 'the video' like REM did, especially around the time of 'Out of Time' (Losing My Religion, Shiny Happy People videos) and 'Automatic for the People' ('Man on the Moon', 'Everybody Hurts' videos). REM played the MTV game: vidoes, interviews, REM weekends, Unplugged, etc. I doubt that Moz would have.
 
Don't know for sure but didn't Moz once said Found, Found, Found is about Michael Stipe?
Found someone in this murkiness. (Someone, at the time maybe the only one, in the musicindustry he liked?)
I thought later Moz said the song came out around the time he was seen with Stipe and someone made the error of saying the song was about Stipe, but that the song wasn't actually about him at all. I've read so many interviews/biographies/etc about Moz that I can't remember what's true and what isn't.
1. This link could be true or it could be made up bull: http://www.gigwise.com/news/18076/Morrissey-Lashes-Out-At-Constant-Michael-Stipe-Rumours
2. This link seems to agree with what you've said: https://books.google.com/books?id=h...und found found' about michael stipe?&f=false
 
Maybe the smiths would have gotten s big but who knows. R.E.M. Had the advantage of alternative music, a scene they helped nurture and were a part of, becoming huge on all levels in the mainstream making people more embracing all around. It's hard to imagine the smiths in the Brit pop era. Don't know if they'd have been huge or just respected and yes R.E.M. Embraced a lot of commercial outings that are hard to imagine the smiths doing though morrissey solo certainly made videos so who knows. I kinda imagine the smiths more like the replacements in this situation. A band that meant a lot to people for there integrity and oppositional stance and there reluctance to make music videos, see boom box video for bastads of young for an example, and kinda left the scene a legend right when the sort of music they championed was coming into fashion. There are of course differences in the bands that made a difference as well. R.E.M. Had a little t of joyful songs in there catalog and were more inclusive and less despairing even when singing about depression. Morrissey would sing no one can possibly know how I feel while stipe would sing everybody hurts. R.E.M. Is more marketable to a general fan base and it's to there credit that they succeeded there and still kept there old fans. Also sometimes the catty archness of the smiths can be of limiting appeal. As for music though it's hard to imagine someone listening to welcome to the occupation and not hearing the smiths
 
Patti Smith

"They were my people. They were exactly the people I had in mind. I wrote "Horses" for Michael Stipe. I wrote "Horses" for Morrissey. And they found it."
 
Well, alternative rock bands from opposite sides of the pond, but both with gay lead singers. They have a lot in common...
 
No, according to Mozipedia this is incorrect.

In one interview Morrissey talked about that song, and then answered a completely unrelated question about Michael Stipe. People mistakenly linked the two.

Okay Flibberty, thank you so much!
I didn't check Mozipedia, which I should. :(
Another myth debunked.
Cheers
 
Hmmm. I see what you mean but I think REM lack the cutting, biting, serrated edge of The Smiths. REM have a couple of duff albums after Automatic For The People so maybe they should have stopped too. Same for The Cure after Wish. Even The Jam could have turned to crap if they hadn't broken up when they did. Sometimes things happen for the best.
I actually think New Adventures in Hi-fi is a great album. Any band with longevity is bound to have a few misfires, and that includes Morrissey. Honestly, after Vauxhall, I think you could compile 2 good albums with cuts from anything after, and a huge pile of B-sides. I agree that REM lacks the caustic humor that makes up a lot of Morrissey's lyrical charm though.
 
Funny story.
I met Michael Stipe at a Gang Of Four show at the 40Watt club in Athens Georgia in 2007. He was in the audience kinda incognito with a toboggan and a coat pulled up, but I instantly knew it was him from the bone structure in his face. He went to the rest room and I waited outside for him to come out. When he did, I tapped him on the shoulder and said word for word.. "Michael, there are two singers I completely adore, that is you and Morrissey". He was pleasantly surprised and said "thank you very much. That means a lot to me".. I said you are very welcome and so nice to meet you..
Very good memory for me.
 
Whenever I hear Losing my religion I plug my ears or turn off the radio. Can't stand the song.

Yeah but still like Man On The Moon and other songs a lot.
And I really love "What's The Frequency Kenneth".
Great song.
 
Frequency Kenneth is a good song on a poor album though. Songs like driver eight sound very much like the smiths. As for comparisons they both in there early days seemed to make the characters in there songs commen men and women and not overly glamorous people which I think was typical of pop in the eighties. The smiths had more classic rock flare especially as they went on and more style but around the first album the smiths still had the feeling of being a working mans band in image while R.E.M. Would look like they were playing in last nights plain brown for a while. Guess that changed around green
 
Funny story.
I met Michael Stipe at a Gang Of Four show at the 40Watt club in Athens Georgia in 2007. He was in the audience kinda incognito with a toboggan and a coat pulled up, but I instantly knew it was him from the bone structure in his face. He went to the rest room and I waited outside for him to come out. When he did, I tapped him on the shoulder and said word for word.. "Michael, there are two singers I completely adore, that is you and Morrissey". He was pleasantly surprised and said "thank you very much. That means a lot to me".. I said you are very welcome and so nice to meet you..
Very good memory for me.

I thought this was going to be a George Michael kind of story...
 
Agree that they changed a lot after leaving IRS but I think they still put out great songs here and there that reminded me of there older stuff. Losing my religion is still a fantastic song along with man on the moon poet imitation of life the great beyond bad day etc. I myself dream about the tour they did with the replacements opening. That would have been a thing to see. I also really enjoyed as an album the song hollow man in it, blanking on the title, as it kinda as a whole reminded me of the early period. Didn't care much for the last album
Album was "accelerate" ... Peter Buck had said he would leave if they didn't do a more "guitar" album ... it's just over 30 minutes long and is great ... living well , not noise is the best revenge indeed
 
The performance reminds me of a Smiths show..


Not this one, by any chance.
hqdefault.jpg

There's definitely something similar, but I can't quite put my finger on it...
 
Maybe the smiths would have gotten s big but who knows. R.E.M. Had the advantage of alternative music, a scene they helped nurture and were a part of, becoming huge on all levels in the mainstream making people more embracing all around. It's hard to imagine the smiths in the Brit pop era. Don't know if they'd have been huge or just respected and yes R.E.M. Embraced a lot of commercial outings that are hard to imagine the smiths doing though morrissey solo certainly made videos so who knows. I kinda imagine the smiths more like the replacements in this situation. A band that meant a lot to people for there integrity and oppositional stance and there reluctance to make music videos, see boom box video for bastads of young for an example, and kinda left the scene a legend right when the sort of music they championed was coming into fashion. There are of course differences in the bands that made a difference as well. R.E.M. Had a little t of joyful songs in there catalog and were more inclusive and less despairing even when singing about depression. Morrissey would sing no one can possibly know how I feel while stipe would sing everybody hurts. R.E.M. Is more marketable to a general fan base and it's to there credit that they succeeded there and still kept there old fans. Also sometimes the catty archness of the smiths can be of limiting appeal. As for music though it's hard to imagine someone listening to welcome to the occupation and not hearing the smiths
I remember reading a review of rem in about 1986 that mentioned them being the US Smiths ... I bought Life's Rich Pageant because of the comparison ... I didn't see the association musically but the group dynamic I quickly saw... both great bands who had great success without playing the game (maybe a bit with rem) ... lover them both
 
Album was "accelerate" ... Peter Buck had said he would leave if they didn't do a more "guitar" album ... it's just over 30 minutes long and is great ... living well , not noise is the best revenge indeed

Yeah I ended up,looking it up after I said that. I to thought that album great with hollow man and supernatural super serious which I think I heard was something Chris Martin said to him. Collapse into now was just ok. I kinda felt like they knew they were going out and made two albums that represented both phases of there career. To bad you didn't get fables of the reconstruction or reckoning as they both to me sound more like the smiths. Lifes rich pageant still has some similarities but that's when they started getting a bit more rock alternative in the older American sense of the word with document and green continuing the trend. Songs like the one I love and end of the world and orange crush. They still had some of the old sound but the first three more folk influenced albums have a guitar sound that really reminds me of the smiths. Songs like the two I mentioned above, driver eight and welcome to the occupation, are prime examples. This said I think a lot of songs here and there could still pop out with that similar sound like religion and even really newer songs like bad which I love. Who knows where the smiths would have gone with there own sound had they continued. Both bands I guess shared a similar spirit and for a while sound but they came from really different places which probably influenced where they would both go. The smiths were always a popular in Britain pop band while rem were in a lot of ways still an underground band in America
 

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